Black Friday
Muted sales, 2023 Recession, and Route to Passive Income
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In the 1950s, factory owners noticed that workers would call in sick the day after Thanksgiving to enjoy an extended four-day weekend. The engineering magazine referred to it as ‘Black Friday’, making it the first mention of the eponymous shopping festival we know today. Another explanation for the name dates back to a time when retailers used red ink to show losses and black ink to show profits. In this paradigm, Black Friday marked the time when retailers started making monthly profits in the shopping season, thus changing the ink from Red to Black.
Either way, at least for the past 3 decades, Black Friday has acted as the bellwether for Americans’ shopping appetite for the holiday season. This is what makes the muted sales and missing shopping lines this Friday particularly concerning.
The dampened sales are indicative of the prevailing market sentiment, with a third of small businesses unable to pay rent in October and personal savings at an all-time low. With headlines reporting waves of layoffs, consumers are pulling back on their discretionary spending. Let’s take a look at what 2023 might have in store for us.
Start of the 2023 Recession
With the Fed set to deliver another rate hike this December, there is little doubt that the credit lines are starting to dry up for many businesses. Accordingly, many organizations are revising estimates and cutting headcounts. In particular, the tech industry is going through a terrible churn right now, with more than 120,000 workers laid off in 2022.
Overall, it seems like we are in for a rough ride next year, with JP Morgan ominously predicting ‘a category 1 economic hurricane in 2023’. Under such circumstances, the best thing you can do is to try your best to stay employed and keep a 6-month emergency fund handy.
Despite their obvious negative impact, recessions also present opportunities to create wealth. In this video, I cover everything you need to know about how you can take advantage of a recession, why investment strategies should be boring, and how well recessions are correlated to the stock market performance (spoiler, they’re not as correlated as you think). Check it out and let me know what you think!
Path Toward Passive Income
Look, I will admit it, I might have a slight obsession with passive income. Despite how lucrative it might sound to have free money hit your account every month, the reality is that there is no easy way to do it. Realistically, passive income is a way for you to leverage your time and effort upfront, so that you can get paid at a later time.
However, if you are interested in starting the journey toward financial independence through passive income, here’s how you can get started with as little as $100. Essentially, you have two choices: invest your time or invest your money. In this video, I cover several strategies towards this like dividends, index funds, upskilling, and starting low-effort businesses, so don’t miss this one!
So that’s it for my Sunday round-up. For the new folks here, in this newsletter, I give a quick recap of whatever you may have missed over the week on Sunday, and on Wednesday, I will be doing my deep-dive article on one of these topics.
See you next week with another bunch of exciting videos!
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Being a full time realtor this is one of the toughest switches I’ve seen in a long time . Sales are down about 50% and a very low inventory. I expect 2023 to be a rough one
2023 is the year I become a full-grown man, I am ready to